The End of the Story

In thinking about difficult relationships with other believers, one of the truths that has been most comforting to me is the glory of Heaven. Not streets of gold, or mansions, or crowns, or harps, but, as Jonathan Edwards liked to say, that “heaven is a world of love!” What has been of immense comfort to me is to think of the certainty of the happy ending. The promise of happiness together in the end is as rock-solid as the truthfulness and power of God. No matter how difficult some relationships may be with other believers in this age, no matter how strained or broken the relational bonds may be in this world, no matter how much we may fail to fully reconcile in this life through pride, foolishness, or misunderstanding, there stands God’s unbreakable promise that the story has a happy ending for his people. Someday, when God completes his work of redemption and brings us all into his presence, we will stand before him, full of love for him and for each other, with no trace of resentment, bitterness, anger, or misunderstanding. It won’t be so important then who was right and who was wrong. Everything will be swallowed up in God’s divine love. Our faces will shine like the stars of heaven, full of unveiled goodness and love. No walls of self-protection. No hidden shame. No bitter regrets. God will be all in all, which is precisely why there will be such unity among us in heaven. Have you noticed how all the saints in heaven portrayed in Revelation are united in their enraptured focus on God? There is no self-promotion in heaven. Probably all relational conflict among believers is attributable in some degree to a self-focus instead of an absolute God-focus. Our dreams, our ideas, our desires, our expectations, or our fears have somehow contaminated the unity we ought to have. I don’t think we can expect perfection in this area this side of heaven. As long as we live in this evil age with remaining sin within us, we will always have some vestige of sinful self-interest. Part of our goal should be to become more and more God-centered in our desires, dreams, and expectations. To do the hard, long work of giving up our cravings for self-glory, self-justification, and self-protection and focus instead on God’s glory, God’s will, God’s power, and God’s love. A chorus I learned as a child says, “Let’s forget about ourselves, and magnify the Lord, and worship him.” Maybe it should say, “Let’s forget about ourselves by magnifying the Lord and worshiping him.” For the sake of maintaining “the unity of the Spirit in the bond of peace” (Eph. 4:3), let’s increasingly forsake self-interest and instead focus humbly on God. That’s a noble goal, but, as I said, I don’t think we’ll ever reach perfection in this area this side of heaven. Which brings me back to my main point. Even though we will never reach relational perfection in this life, we have God’s sure promise that in the end, we will be standing side by side, full of love and pure affection for each other, all hurts healed and relationships restored, enjoying the glory of God’s presence together. This thought gives me great comfort, joy, and hope, and helps me to be patient and persevering in the midst of strained or broken relationships, knowing with certainty that we will love each other in the end, by the grace and power of God.